The Bonnevilles
Dirty Photographs

A record like this is always something I enjoy. I mean, changing, experimenting with new listens, and also testing yourself and your musical preferences is always one of the most interesting aspects when it comes to listening to new music as a way of having new experiences, opening yourself to new perspectives. All of this is very beautiful and constitutes an important source of cultural and spiritual enrichment. But then there always comes that moment when you have to return home, and when it happens, sometimes it feels good. I'm obviously talking about rock and roll, the long face of Robert Johnson, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Bo Diddley, the myth of Elvis Presley, up to the Stones, Jimi Hendrix, bla bla bla.

You never get tired of this stuff, and this happens simply because if it's true that the "blues" is the music of the soul, in the same way, we all have something that burns inside us: then there are those who recognize it, some who pretend nothing, and those who ultimately make deals with the devil and become immortal like Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Even though, in the end, who can say that Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Elvis Presley, Jim Morrison are truly dead: I haven't seen their corpse, and anyway life lasts more or less like a car ride in a movie with James Dean. Then what remains is the crash, and this remains even if you've burned everything inside during that unique ride, driving with your eyes closed but with your hands firmly on the wheel as if wanting to touch material life until the end.

The Bonnevilles are a duo composed of Andrew McGibbon Jr. and Chris McMullen. They immodestly define themselves as the toughest thing to come out of Northern Ireland since Van Morrison and the Them and the Stiff Little Fingers. They come from Belfast and have been around since 2010 when they released an EP titled "Hardtale Lurgan Blues". Their latest record is called "Dirty Photographs" and was released on Alive Natural Records on March 16. The record is probably their most irreverent and politically incorrect work. Certainly contaminated by that typical garage-punk virus, which manifests itself in all its vigor with the various "Be My Side", "Long Runs The Fox", "The Poachers Pocket", "Panakromatik", and in the enigmatic and explosive "Robo 6000", the album picks up Rolling Stones patterns both in more typically rock and roll tracks like "Dirty Photographs" (McGibbon explains the song as a homage and celebration of his wife's butt) and the blues mood of "Don't Curse the Darkness", "Fever of the New Zealot", and the ballad "The Rebel Shrug".

Probably nothing new under the sun. But then again, I told you this record here is like a return home; that doesn't mean staying quiet and calm. There must be a reason, after all, if most accidents happen within the home. As long as you keep listening to records like this, it's inevitable.